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METEOROS Nr. 02/2005

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… zeigt einen Überraschungsfund: Eisen-Nickel-Meteorite auf dem Mars. Im Originaltext des Astronomy-Picture-of-the-Day heißt es dazu: &amp;quot;What has the Opportunity rover found on Mars? While traversing a vast empty plain in Meridiani Planum, one of Earth's yearling rolling robots found a surprise when visiting the location of its own metallic head shield discarded last year during descent. The surprise is the rock visible on the lower left, found to be made mostly of dense metals iron and nickel. The large cone-shaped object behind it - and the flank piece on the right - are parts of Opportunity's jettisoned head shoeld. Smaller shield debris is also visible. Scientists do not think that the basketball-sized metal &amp;quot;Head Shield Rock&amp;quot; originated on Mars, but rather is likely an ancient metallic meteorite. In hindsight, finding a meteorite in a vast empty dust plain on Mars might be considered similar to Earth meteorites found on the vast empty ice plains of Antartica. The finding raises speculations about the general abundance of rocks on Mars that have fallen there from outer space.